The Corpuscular Theory of Matter

by J. J. Thomson

Overview

It is stated in the preface that this book is an expansion of the series of lectures delivered at the Royal Institution in the spring of 1906.

The book consists of seven chapters which deal respectively with the origin and properties of corpuscles, the two different corpuscular theories of metallic conduction, and in the number and arrangement of corpuscles in the atom.

In the first chapter corpuscles in vacuum tubes are considered, and 'evidence is given showing that the corpuscles act as carriers of electricity, and that a positively electrified body owes its positive electrification to a defect of corpuscles. Also a positive charge is always associated with a mass comparable to that of the hydrogen or helium atom, whereas the corpuscles appear always to have the same mass, viz., that of about 1/1700 the atom of hydrogen.

As is well known, the positive ions are given off by radium, and constitute the "X" rays. These have been examined by Rutherford and others, and the ratios of - e/m measured.

The second chapter deals with the origin of the corpuscle, and here all the arguments are carefully set forth, and these tend to show that its mass is wholly electrical in origin.

The evidence for the existence of corpuscles afforded by the Zeeman effect is discussed in a most luminous manner.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781663516701
Publisher:	Dapper Moose Entertainment
Publication date:	06/12/2020
Pages:	182
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.42(d)

About the Author

J. J. Thomson (1856 – 1940) was an English physicist and Nobel Laureate in Physics, credited with the discovery and identification of the electron, the first subatomic particle to be discovered. Thomson was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society and appointed to the Cavendish Professorship of Experimental Physics at the Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge in 1884. Thomson won numerous awards and honors during his career.